Easter comes early this year. Due to some complicated formula dreamt up by Emperor Constantine, the date of Easter moves between March 22 and April 25 each year. It has something to due with the phases of the moon and the vernal equinox. Could we get any more complicated, Constantine? I think not. This year will be the earliest date that Easter will be celebrated for the next 150 years I'm told. So, I probably won't have to worry about a March 23 Easter ever again.

But, back to my Peter Cottontail story. History tells us that the early Christians took the humble egg as a sign of new birth. After all, baby chicks pop out of eggs everyday. But so do alligators, I guess, but we've somehow chosen not to paint alligator eggs. New life popping out of a shell gives us all hope that we'll enjoy the hereafter if all goes well down here below.

Painting the Easter eggs seems to have started with missionaries who were trying to convert a bunch of pagan Saxons in northern Europe somewhere in the second century. It seems the pagans were freely celebrating the rites of spring and fertility and when the missionaries arrived they found a new way to intertwine their teachings with the pagan Saxons ritual, which at that time was called Easter. The missionaries simply switched the "r" and the "e" at the end of the word and presto, we had Easter! The rest is history.

German immigrants brought the Easter egg tradition to America and the day itself seems to have not been universally celebrated until after the Civil War. Or as the Southerners call it, the War Between The States. Some lady down in Chattanooga once told me there was nothing "civil" about that war, so they call it the War Between The States. She got rather angry when I referred to the Civil War, but, I digress.

Those stoic Germans, who had found a way to live through the dark and dreary days of a long winter on the prairies, needed a little color in their lives and started the tradition of coloring eggs in honor of the Easter holiday. For a stern and somber German to celebrate was a bit of a trick, but they managed it somehow and I grew up in a largely German farm community with colorful Easter bunny eggs on Easter morning.

Easter morning was second only to Christmas Eve in my book. I found it tough to sleep, knowing that somewhere downstairs sat a basket full of imitation grass and a bunch of colored eggs and a chocolate rabbit with solid chocolate ears. My parents must have waited until they knew unconsciousness had come to their tribe before they hid the baskets in every nook and cranny of the farmhouse. Only after I was old enough to shed the innocence of youth, was I allowed to actually help create the colored eggs for my five brothers and sisters. It was kind a rite of entering adulthood when you were asked to help dye eggs.

We sang the song "Peter Cottontail," ate candy until we were almost ill and foundered ourselves on hard boiled eggs that had somehow become cracked in the excitement of the moment. We always looked forward to seeing Dad find a colored egg in his farm boot. I figured the rabbit must have been an equal-opportunity egg dispenser and age had nothing to do with being presented with a colored egg.

There will be Easter egg hunts this weekend. Kids will scurry about collecting their egg treasures and dentists will cringe at the thought of all that sugar on the teeth of a kid, but it's worth the risk. No doubt there will be more than a few fillings pulled from their moorings by one of those stretchy, yellow marshmallow chickens.

I'll be humming strains of "Peter Cottontail" as I walk the dog on Easter morning. The dog will look at me like I'm a little crazy. Just like those pagan Saxons looked at the missionaries so long ago. Hopefully, no rabbit will run across our path through the woods. I'd hate to have the black Lab ruin the Easter Bunny's day.

See you next time and Happy Easter! Okay?